


4 Times People Found Out They Were Dating, And The One Who Always Knew.

by imaginationisrainbowcoloured



Category: Newsies (1992), Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: 4 + 1 things, 5+1 Things, Best Friends, Canon Compliant, Canon Era, Established Relationship, Friendship, Homophobia, Homophobic Language, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Post-Canon, Secret Relationship, Walking In On Someone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:29:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26233465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginationisrainbowcoloured/pseuds/imaginationisrainbowcoloured
Summary: “Jack, all the littles are asleep. You don’t need my help.”“It’s not the point is it?” Jack hissed back, teeth clenched and very aware that raising his voice would wake them up.“Then what the hell is the point?”“You keep sneaking out! And don’t think I don’t know where you’re going, you’re sneaking over to Brooklyn every night, ain’t ya?”Race didn’t see the point in denying it. “Yeah, I am, what’s it to you?”“What’s it to me? You’re my second! Mine! If you wanna be Brooklyn so bad, you might as well stay there.”“Maybe I will.” Race snapped, keeping his voice low, and then he turned and left, continuing his original path out of the lodging house, pausing to call back to Jack, “Don’t expect me back in the morning.”
Relationships: Albert DaSilva & Racetrack Higgins, Crutchie & Racetrack Higgins, Jack Kelly/Katherine Plumber, Katherine Plumber Pulitzer/Darcy Reid, Racetrack Higgins & David Jacobs, Racetrack Higgins & Jack Kelly, Racetrack Higgins & Katherine Plumber Pulitzer, Spot Conlon/Racetrack Higgins
Comments: 8
Kudos: 89





	4 Times People Found Out They Were Dating, And The One Who Always Knew.

1- Jack

Jack was, to most people, pretty mild-mannered. The angriest most newsies had seen him had been during the strike, and even then, it wasn’t anything on how angry some of the other older newsies could get. 

Some people said that he was mild-mannered thanks to the years of being in charge of the newsies, others argued that he was their leader because he was so calm all the time, but it was irrelevant really. Jack was calm. He was the one who broke up fights, he never started them unless he was defending someone. 

This was the reason it was such a surprise when Jack and Race got into a heated argument one night after the littles had gone to bed.

“Jack, all the littles are asleep. You don’t need my help.”

“It’s not the point is it?” Jack hissed back, teeth clenched and very aware that raising his voice would wake them up.

“Then what the hell is the point?”

“You keep sneaking out! And don’t think I don’t know where you’re going, you’re sneaking over to Brooklyn every night, ain’t ya?”

Race didn’t see the point in denying it. “Yeah, I am, what’s it to you?”

“What’s it to me? You’re my second! Mine! If you wanna be Brooklyn so bad, you might as well stay there.”

“Maybe I will.” Race snapped, keeping his voice low, and then he turned and left, continuing his original path out of the lodging house, pausing to call back to Jack, “Don’t expect me back in the morning.”

Race was many things, a gambler, a newsie, but most importantly he was true to his word. He was not back in the morning, or the evening. Through the day Jack could put on an indifferent face- “I’m not in control of where he goes, he sells in Brooklyn anyway, he’ll be back this evening”- but when Racer was nowhere to be seen come sunset he began to worry. The littles sensed that, they knew something was wrong when it wasn’t Race who woke them in the morning, he would always tell them if he wouldn’t be there.

“I want Racer to tuck me in.” Rain objected. A chorus of ‘me too’s agreed with him and Jack found himself looking around the littles’ area hopelessly.

“He ain’t back yet kid, sorry.”

A couple of them started crying and Jack looked around desperately for help. To his relief, Albert and Crutchie had come in to settle them down.

Albert caught his shoulder as he moved out, “You need to apologise to him. He’s Manhattan, and we need him.

“I will. In the morning.”

Morning came and Jack bought less papers than usual, planning his walk over to Brooklyn and his apology to Race in his head. He managed to sell a few on the walk, stopped by one passer-by to ask where the boy he normally bought from was because he hadn’t seen him today or yesterday. Jack gave a quick and hopefully sufficient answer and walked on, behind him the man shrugged and opened his paper.

“Ay! Hot Shot!” Jack called, gratefully upon seeing Spot’s second, Hot Shot gave him a cold look.

“You ain’t supposed to be in Brooklyn.”

“I’m looking for Racer.”

Hot Shot stared at him for a couple seconds.

“I’m here to apologise.”

“He’s with Spot.”

“Thanks.”

Jack walked away, forcing himself not to glance back at Hot Shot despite the feeling of eyes on the back of his neck. Everyone knew Spot’s normal selling place; it was where his newsies could find him with a problem or where other boroughs could find him to discuss business. 

The only problem was that Spot was nowhere in sight when he approached the docks.

Confused, Jack began to wander around, glancing around and listening out in case Spot had decided that he’d had enough of Race on his turf and was going to soak him. He glanced down an alley, saw two boys kissing and hurriedly kept going. It was weird, he thought, that Spot hadn’t gotten rid of the boys who used his selling spot as a make out spot.

“Kelly!” He turned at Spot’s voice,

“I’ve been looking all over for you two!”

Spot raised an eyebrow, Race was standing a little way behind him and his lips looked kinda swollen, and he had a bruise on his neck and- oh. Jack almost laughed, how had he missed that? This was why Race had been sneaking over to Brooklyn at night, this was why Spot was alright with him selling in Brooklyn.

“I’m sorry,” he found himself saying, before he’d even finished processing his stupidity, “I know you’re Manhattan, and I shouldn’t have accused you have being a traitor or anything, but I need you- I can’t run it without ya.”

“How sweet.” Spot muttered, but he shut up when Race moved past him to hug Jack.

“That was all I needed.”

“I know, I’m sorry.” He paused and glanced at Spot. “I get it now.”

*

2- Davey

Jack ran Manhattan and Davey had been his right-hand man during the strike, so he guessed it made a small amount of sense that some newsies from other boroughs assumed he was now Jack’s second. Most didn’t seem to care either way when he corrected them until he ran into Queens’ second. He couldn’t remember the kid’s name, and the kid only called him ‘Mouth’ so he wasn’t really interested in learning it.

“Ay, Mouth.”

“Hey.”

“I just want to tell ya that when I take over for Queens I wanna make a proper alliance with ‘Hattan, now you’re the second.”

Davey nearly told him that he wasn’t the second, that was still Race no matter what people seemed to think, but the kid’s attitude confused him. “Why not before?”

“Didn’t wanna when there was a risk of having to deal with the last one.”

“The last… second? Racer?"

“Yeah, fuckin’ fairy, y’know?”

Davey did not, in fact, know, but he nodded anyway and didn’t correct the kid because he was a little worried about what his reaction would be. He found Les and Jack quite easily due to the amount of noise they were making and quietly explained what the kid from Queens had said to him, only saying that he apparently didn’t like Race for whatever reason.  
Jack’s face went hard, and he nodded, smiling when Les turned back to them. “I’ll arrange a meeting with Queens soon.” Was all he said, and Davey relaxed, it wasn’t his problem anymore.

Or he thought it wasn’t. Not correcting the kid had apparently been a mistake because he had gone and blabbed to a load of his friends about how the Mouth was replacing the fairy, and it had got to Brooklyn, which was why an angry Spot Conlon had shown up at their lodging house demanding to speak to Jack. Both Davey and Race had got up when he had come in, but both been ignored.

Together they watched the boys argue from the window, Spot kept hitting his cane on the ground as if the emphasise a point.

“What do you think’s wrong?” Davey asked, knowing Race knew Spot much better than he ever would.

“Apparently some kid from Queens has been going around saying Jack made you second.” Race replied, “he asked me about it today.”

“Oh God,” Davey muttered, remembering the kid from a few weeks back.

Race turned his head to stare at him, “What? What did you do?”

Normally he would have been slightly offended by the accusatory tone in Race’s voice, but the guilt at maybe being the cause of this overwhelmed that and he quickly retold the conversation.

Race frowned, “He say why he didn’t like me?”

“Yeah… he called you a fairy. I don’t…”

“You don’t know what that means?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m queer.”

“Queer?”

“I like boys like most guys like girls.”

“Oh.”

“Oh?”

Spot’s anger suddenly seemed to make more sense. Spot didn’t hate Davey; he wouldn’t have this big of an issue with him being Jack’s second. He was angry on Race’s behalf.  
When he saw Spot pull Race out of sight, just before he left, Davey waited until Race came back.

“So, Spot, huh?”

Race threw a cigar at him, “Shut up.”

*

3- Crutchie

Crutchie walked in on them, there was no long build up to him finding out, he just refused to be distracted by Davey who knew exactly what Spot and Race were doing on the roof. (making out)

Davey knowing had been a slight relief to Race, he could tell one person the truth- who actually bought him a new shirt, why he had a small flower behind his ear, where he was gonna take Spot the few times he came to the Lower Manhattan lodging house rather than the other way around. And Davey had performed admirably in the position of confidant, even going as far as to distract anyone who made like they were going to wherever Spot and Race were hiding.

This time, he had failed. Crutchie wasn’t as easily distracted as the other newsies (neither was Jack, but he was still keeping Race’s secret) and he had noticed Davey’s pattern. He had also noticed bruises on Race after Spot had been by and was suspicious.

Slipping away from the group and making sure he was out of Davey’s eyeline, Crutchie quietly made it up the stairs, as quietly as one could when using a wooden crutch. Unfortunately, Race and Spot were very confident in Davey’s abilities and slightly distracted by each other, and so did not hear the crutch on the stairs or anything at all until Crutchie went “Oh my God!”

Yanking away from each other they both gaped up at him, trying to come up with some excuse for why they had been kissing. Crutchie gaped back and the roof was silent for a very long time.

Eventually Crutchie found his voice again, “Sorry, I’ll just, uh…” he backed away finding the door with his hand, “Carry on!” and then he fled, as fast as he could, sitting next to Davey and swearing that he would never doubt him again.

Up on the roof Race and Spot watched him go and immediately started laughing, great gasping laughs of relief and hysteria.

“It’s Crutchie. He wouldn’t tell anyone.” They reassured each other, “We’re safe.”

*

4- Katherine 

Katherine hadn’t really meant to become part of the newsies group, she had just been hanging around them because she was dating Jack, and after they broke up, because she was friends with Davey and his sister and the lodging house was really the only place she could meet up with them. Anyway, she accidentally had become part of the group and Race had taught her to play card games, she was pretty certain he let her win whenever she did, but he was a naturally nice person and they never did it for money between the two of them due to the huge imbalance.

Regardless of the imbalance, the three years between them, and the fact that they had almost no common interests, one year on from the strike, Katherine considered Race one of her closest friends. Weirdly, she found that he was also the person she went to for relationship advice when Darcy asked her on a date- Race was kind, slightly cynical, understanding of her confusion and supportive when she eventually decided that she did want to go on the date.

Three months into dating Darcy, it suddenly hit her that Race gave shockingly good advice, almost as if he were in a long-term relationship and understood personally. He was especially good at advice when Darcy had to move away to help his father with business.

“Are you seeing anyone?” she asked as they sat down at the back of the room for their private game,

“Like dating, a ghost or a shrink?” Race responded, grinning up at her,

“Dating.”

“Why miss Pulitzer, you are a taken woman!”

She threw her cards at him, “Answer the question, idiot.”

He sobered suddenly, “Why do you want to know?”

“You give advice like you are. To me, about Darcy.”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah?”

“I am seeing someone.”

Sensing that he didn’t really want her to push the subject, Katherine nodded and picked up her cards again. Race did not, staring at the small table instead.  
“It’s Spot.”

“What?”

“I’m seeing Spot.”

She blinked twice. Not selling papers meant that she only really spent time with the newsies in the evening and she wasn’t completely aware of the complex newsie politics, but… “The King of Brooklyn?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m impressed,” she told him, trying to steer the conversation back to the light-hearted joking he seemed to prefer, “that’s some catch.”  
Race laughed and finally picked up his cards again, “For sure.”

Later as she was leaving he hugged her, “Thanks Kath.”

*

+1- Albert 

Albert prided himself on being Race’s best friend, the first person to know when something was wrong or right in Race’s life, the first person Race told when he had won big at the races and he had spent years in that position. Years that he had spent learning Race’s body language, learning how to tell how Race was feeling at a glance and he could.

He could always tell when Race was unhappy or upset and would know what to bring to make him feel better- and the reverse, he could always tell when Race was happy, and about a week after the strike was settled Race had started coming home after selling happy every single day.

Curious, Albert had asked to sell with him at Sheepshead one day and had been accepted. Race chattered on, as usual, as they made their way across the Brooklyn Bridge and towards the races. They split up to sell- two newsies in one place sold less papers- and met up again for lunch, where they were joined by none other than his majesty himself, Spot Conlon. Albert’s first thought was that he had come to argue about Albert selling in Brooklyn, but Race’s explanation that the two of them just hadn’t spent much time together seemed to fly just fine, and Spot bought all three of them lunch.

Watching Race while he ate his sandwich, Albert finally understood what was making him so happy- it was Spot. Just Spot. Always Spot. And when Spot leaned in to brush a crumb off Race’s face, apparently having forgotten Albert was there, Albert relaxed, happy in the knowledge that his best friend was loved.

He watched the others find out, was the first one that Jack cornered to ask about it when he brought Race back from Brooklyn after their argument, watched as Davey protected them whenever they were in Manhattan and was thankful when Kath and Crutchie gave their acceptance in their own ways. 

But, Race was still his best friend, his brother, and it was immensely satisfying to be able to give the King of Brooklyn the shovel talk.

**Author's Note:**

> that was a fuckin rollercoaster to write   
> love the fics where jack is like 'why are u going over to Brooklyn????' and it turns out gay  
> sorry abt the homophobia :( if it makes u feel better im also gay


End file.
